Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the use of polypeptides having protease activity and polynucleotides encoding the polypeptides. The invention also relates to nucleic acid constructs, vectors, and host cells comprising the polynucleotides as well as methods of producing the polypeptides. The present invention particularly relates to the use of polypeptides having protease activity in food application and in detergents.
Description of the Related Art
Enzymes have been used for many decades in the cleaning compositions such as detergents for various purposes such as laundry and dish wash in house hold care and industrial cleaning. A mixture of different enzymes are used each performing its specific activity to specific substances constituting soil from various stains. Proteases are enzymes which degrade proteins and can be used in cleaning processes such as dish wash and laundry to remove the proteinaceous stains. The most commonly used proteases are the serine proteases, in particular subtilases. This family has previously been further grouped into 6 different sub-groups by Siezen RJ and Leunissen JAM, 1997, Protein Science, 6, 501-523. One of these sub-groups is the subtilisin family which includes subtilases such as SAVINASE®, ALCALASE® (Novozymes A/S) and BLAP® (Henkel AG). Over the years the subtilisins and other proteases has been genetically engineered to increase their performance. Typically the proteases are designed to fulfil different purposes such as to increase their wash performance e.g. at low temperature conditions and/or increase their capacity to remove certain stains. Commercially known genetically engineered proteases includes RELASE®, POLARZYME®, KANNASE®, LIQUANASE®, OVOZYME®, CORONASE®, BLAZE® (Novozymes A/S), PROPERASE®, PURAFECT PRIME®, PURAFECT OX®, FN3®, FN4®, EXCELLASE® and ULTIMASE® (Danisco/DuPont). Despite the availability of many optimized proteases designed for various purposes the compositions of the soiling and stains are very complex and the wash conditions and detergent composition changes to meet different user needs. All factors which makes the availability of different types of proteases for use in cleaning and detergents advantageous.